Tag Archives: Goals/Results

January was a bit of an experiment with flash fiction and now slushing for an ezine, and having a house guest for nearly three weeks, but not only did I survive, I flourished. It feels good getting the writing moving again like this.

Short Stories Drafts: 6 Flash Fiction

Short Story Revisions: 5 Flash Fiction + 1 short story (still in progress)

Rejections: 2

Submissions: 2 new and 3 resubmissions

Critiques: 3

Reading: 2 (The Runelords by David Farland, Kitty Goes To Washington by Carrie Vaughn)

February Goals

I wasn’t able to work on the novel in January because I underestimated how much time a contest in my writer’s group required, plus it would have been unfair to my houseguest. That goal is moving out to February and March. It’s increasing my daily wordcount, but that’s manageable if I manage my secondary projects carefully. I do have submission deadlines, and my short story activity will be adjusted to deal with those.

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So much happened in 2012, that looking back upon it all, I’m dizzy. The day job, which I rarely mention publicly, has been moving in the right direction. I’ve had the opportunity to learn a little about project management and my work is improving for it. I’m looking forward to more learning and new projects in the coming year. The family situation had some serious bumps which will not ever be forgotten. I try to hold it close and apply it to my daily life to make better decisions. The kidlets and spouse went through some of those bumps as well, but they’re back to their old selves. The Girl is excelling in school but still experiencing shyness issues, and the Boy continues to outshine me in the independence department which makes some days really interesting. The spouse continues to make me proud, and the cats, well, they’re still vomiting everywhere but I’m grateful to have them with us at the ripe old kitty age of fourteen.

And you thought all I ever talked about was my writing. Wait for it….

The writing. It’s been a tremendous year from my writing. I spent the early part of the year planning and world building a novel and characters to write Winter Warrior. I wrote 8 chapters, and revised three of them for submission to Viable Paradise. I was accepted into the 2012 class and attended the workshop in October. Being accepted was only half as exciting as actually attending. I’ve written since the workshop: two short stories and a novella. I’ve been revising some older items that needed a clean up post workshop. I gave one of the new stories a serious overhaul, which will go into submissions very shortly. This is good, but I definitely note that this year was a “quality” year as opposed to “quantity”. I wrote some really good stories, and spent lots of time learning about my writing and figuring out how to fix what needs fixing.

I attempted Write1Sub1 for the second year in a row. Since the quantity angle didn’t quite work, I didn’t make my W1S1 goals. I’ll be trying again in 2013.

Writing Friends. Between WorldCon and Viable Paradise, I met a lot of people who were previously screen names and email addresses to me before. There were personalities behind those avatars, but there isn’t anything like meeting those people in person and seeing them for who they really are. I met a bunch of people whom I had no idea existed, who have become part of a special circle of friends. We may not talk much or see each other often, but the bond is there. I hope to try and keep these new friendships going in 2013.

Here’s the official count for 2012:

· Novel Draft: Winter Warrior – in progress 26/80k

· Short Story Drafts 6

· Novella Drafts/Conversions 1

· Short Story Revision: 11

· New Submissions: 4

· Short Story Submissions: 80

· Short Story Rejections 86

· Short Story Acceptance: 1

· Critiques: 22

· Reading: 23

· May SAD = 12 outlines

· VP 16 application work (26k written, 8k revised)

· Worldcon 8/30-9/3

· Viable Paradise 16 10/7-12

· W1S1 Monthly (faltering progress)

Let’s look ahead to 2013, shall we? I’ve learned a lot that I need to put to use. (Not that I haven’t, mind you, but it’s one of those use-it-or-lose-it notions.) The novel needs to be finished and revised. I’d like to get it out to critiquers by the end of 2013 in hopes of revising it for submission in 2014. I’m also keeping up with the short fiction.

Monthly Writing Goals

Novel Writing: Winter Warrior – Jan, Feb, Mar (15k monthly/5k weekly)

Novel Revision: Winter Warrior – April – October

Short Story (Write 2 – Revise 3 – Submit 1)

Blog: 4-8x

Critique: 4

Read: 2-3

This means Write 1 Sub 1 again. This means FMWriters’ May Story-A-Day Challenge. This means getting my schedule back on track, fast. I’m getting back to my morning workouts, which will help my fitness goals. Those aren’t as complex as the writing goals, fortunately, but I’ll be evaluating them monthly as well. I’ll be training for a 5k in May, so the running needs to get back on track. I’d like to be able to run the full race course as opposed to last year’s ½ run ½ walk. To prepare this, I need to run three times a week, and lift weights twice. The new schedule I’ve devised should help, taking away the question of “what do I do today” and having the plan ready to go. In the recent past, overworking (trying to do too much across the board) and undersleeping have made mornings difficult. The 5am alarm doesn’t wake me. Instead, I go into autopilot and turn it off. I have discovered a new trick – using the alarm in my cell phone, which has a soft chime and a light that goes on when the chime starts. Getting the fitness on track will help get everything else to line up where and when it should.

So that’s the plan.

It IS a plan. These are not resolutions. I’ll be updating on the 1st of each month with my progress, but in between those updates, I plan on blogging a bit about my fitness adventures, and also about some cooking fun. I’m no chef, but I do love food, and I’d like to share my favorite recipes and experiments with you.

Thank you all for sticking me this year, and especially to those of you who reached out in my silence. I’m grateful for this blog and the people I keep in touch with because of it, my writing communities, and the ability to connect at any given moment. The writing life can be a solitary one, but with people like you, it isn’t. I wish you the best 2013 possible and if there’s some way I can help make it better, let me know.

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October was without a doubt the most volatile month of my life. I went from the high of attending Viable Paradise, to my father’s death, to the hurricane experience. If it wasn’t for my writing and the venting and rampaging via the written word, I would not have been as strong as I was.

Writing came off schedule for these two months, but my accomplishments are good enough, considering everything.

I’m picking and choosing what to finish this year. I won’t make all the goals I’d hoped to make, but I’ve also learned the difference between quality work with takes more revision time as opposed to quantity which means stories may not be ready if I rush the revision. With my schedule, that means I’m taking as much as two weeks for the full revision.

Year end for me in 2012 will be getting stories back into submissions, and getting my new short stories revised and critiqued. If I can get them out before 12/31, I will, but not by sacrificing a story’s revision quality to make a number. The first novella (and yes, this one is just a novella!) needs finishing.

Blogging: my blogging will be minimal this month as I try to tie things up and prepare for 2013. I’ve been wanting to broaden my blog content by writing about cooking/baking, diet/fitness, and the occasional parenting failure lesson. I could write these up into articles and sell them, but I’m just not there time wise. I’d rather just share. More on that next month.

So, these are my December plans. What are you up to in the next few weeks? Are holidays taking over your life or have you promised yourself some quiet time with a good book?

Dawn

PS Erin Hartshorn hit me up with The Next Big Thing meme. I’ll be responding to that this week.

I’m delighted with my 2011 accomplishments. I balanced my very busy job, family life, and writing, including dealing with injury time when typing was not available to me with both hands. I achieved the intensity I desired. Even on days I didn’t write new words, I did something writing specific and productive.

The biggest thing is that I finished the novel, Shadow of Blood. It needs work, a reasonable assessment since I started it in 2005, dropped it for a pregnancy, dropped it for an injury, and then very nearly dropped it due to another injury. But I went to paper and pen for that segment and got it done. I did not want to stop and start it again. No way.

The next bit I’m happy about is the number of stories I pushed into submissions. I revised better, so I needed fewer edit passes, and didn’t linger on stories. I even managed an honorable mention from the Writers of the Future contest, and have been shortlisted twice this year for publication. I’m seeing the results of my hard work.

I didn’t do much with my children’s stories. I need to read more chapter books before I really feel comfortable with those, but I’ll get there. I’m getting ideas and jotting them down.

I did a good job critiquing this year, but I’d like it to become more day to day in 2012. It’s helped me a lot, especially trying to analyze stories that felt stronger than mine.

Time to check out the new goals for 2012.

Main Goal: Quality

Novel Draft: TBD

Novel Revision: Shadow of Blood

Short Story Drafts 15

Novella Drafts/Conversions 3

Short Story/Novella Edits: 26

Novella Revision 6

New Submissions: 12

Short Story Submissions: 75

Children’s Stories written: 12

Children’s Stories revised: 12

Crits: 52

Book Reading: 24

FM Writing Challenges

VP 16 application due June

W1S1 Monthly

The goal for this year is quality. I’m not rushing for quantity – I’m trying to get it right early on, using the skills I’ve been developing.

To that end, I’m going to write a new novel and revise the one I’ve just written.

Short stories are continuing with a goal of 15 short stories, 12 picture books, and 3 novellas. The novellas are already in short story form and need expansion/development into their full forms. Revisions follow that, naturally.

I’ll be attending Chicon7, my first major speculative fiction convention. I’ll be applying to my dream workshop again, this time with the novel instead of short stories in the hopes of actually being accepted.

2012 is going to be huge for me. I can’t wait to see what I can accomplish.

Good luck to you in 2012, whatever your goals and dreams may be.

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September has been a busy month between work and home
life, but I produced. I have several items I’m currently in the middle, but are
promising. I’m looking forward to October, finishing the current projects and
moving onto new ones. I made my WOTF submission early, so there wasn’t any end-of-the-month do-or-die chaos. The current story revision is requiring additional scenes, to the point it may not be a short story when I’m done. I’m riding the wave, anxiously looking for the beach I’ll land on, but enjoying the ride in the meantime. The story draft in progress is in the planning phase. It’s going to be a space opera with some rather interesting creatures in a heart wrenching situation. I’d started it for a themed contest, and though the theme appears in a clever manner, I need to cement it down better. These two projects are my main goals for October. I’m aiming for more than these, of course, but I’d really like to see these to completion. Here we go. :)

Results:

Novel: on the back burner until November

Short Story Drafts: 1 (+ 1 in progress)

Short Story Revisions:4 (+ 1 in progress)

Crits: 3 (+ 1 in progress)

Reading: 1 (+ 2 in progress)

Submissions: 1 for the 9/30 WOTF deadline (success!)

Rejections: 8

Submissions: 2 new + 8 resubs

Goals:

Short Stories – write 2, revise 5 (1 submission)

Crits – 8

Read – 2

Blogging

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Murphy reared its ugly head all through February. The kids were sick the entire month, going from illness to illness, child to parent, etc, and work exploded in projects and the like. I attempted to write, and did somewhat, but nothing made it to completion. I did some reading, but mostly I did my best to say sane. And that’s okay. I’m scaling down my March goals because work isn’t letting up. Honestly, it probably won’t for a good six months, at least. Which means I need to rework my methods so I can get projects through to completion.

February Results:

Short stories: one partially written, one partially revised.

Novel: total fail.

Children’s stories: total fail.

Rejections: 3

Resubmissions: 2

Reading: The Wedding, by Nicholas Sparks + I scoured the Writers Digest Handbook of Short Story Writing

March Goals

Short Story Writing: 1.5 (complete the one in progress + write a new one)

Short Story Revising: 2 (deadlines for WOTF and Triangulation are close)

Crits: No need to go overboard, but I belong to two crit groups and I’m not carrying my weight. One or two for each would be nice.

I’m also starting a running program with a friend. I’m a firm believer in body/mind alignment, and if one is out of shape, the other isn’t far behind. It’s time to start thinking about the girl’s next birthday and plan the big bash (she’s turning 5). So much to do.. and I’m already late getting started. Happy March!

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January started with a bang, most of this was done in the first two weeks. Third week involved the two-year-old and his health issues, and the fourth week was spent on crits. I’d like to do a better job of consistency next month, but overall, I’m pleased at my productivity. I also sent out my VP application. Hard to believe it’s only been a month since it’s out. Man, it’s going to be a long wait.

January Results

Novel: writing – 3.5k

Read – 2

Crits – 2 (1 novel crit, 1 short story)

Stories Written: 2

Stories Revised: 2

Picture Book drafts: 2

Picture Book revision: 1

Submissions 5

New Subs: 2

Stories in Submissions: 6 (+2 with the VP application)

Write 1 Sub1 on course @ 2 + 2

February alas is a short month, and I feel like I’m starting it in a bad place. I hope I can turn this around. My main motivation is completion of tasks, so I broke the novel down into a different form than “daily novel writing”. I took a good look at my chapters and how they’re typically 2 – 3 scenes, so I’m aiming for 3 scenes weekly. If I do more, that’s good, but at the very least, I’ll get a chapter done a week instead of one per month.

February Goals

Novel: writing – 3 scenes weekly

Short Story Drafts x2

Short Story Revision x2

Read x2

Crits x4

Picture Book draft x1

Picture Book revision x1

New Submissions 2 (aiming for my Triangulation story + my writers of the future story)